Again Jesus began to teach by the lake. The crowd that gathered around him was so large that he got into a boat and sat in it out on the lake, while all the people were along the shore at the water’s edge.
- Mark 4:1
That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, “Let us go over to the other side.” Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him. A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?”
He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.
He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?”
They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!”
- Mark 4:35-41
“Matthew, Mark, and Luke all relay the story of a perfect storm in the lives of Jesus’ disciples. Qn that night a quiet boat ride turned into a terrifying brush with death. While Matthew (8:23-27) and Luke (8:22-25) cover the basic facts, Mark’s version of the event is the most detailed (4:1, 35-41).
“The Gospels record that Jesus was near exhaustion, and His twelve disciples were reeling from the rigorous training He’d been giving them. The crowds had been overwhelming. Sick people, craving His healing touch, had flocked to Jesus on every street. The disciples stood in awe of their Master’s miracles and were astonished that He expected them to perform miracles too. Their lives were being turned inside out. …
“Fatigue. Confusion. Darkness. Tempest. The perfect storm had arrived. It was as if all their fears had combined and crystallized. As fishermen, they had a deep, fearful respect for the turbulent water. As men, they had a deep but relatively untested respect for Jesus. But now this Jesus—the One they had left everything to follow—had led them right into the storm. To make matters worse, He had dozed off, having no apparent concern for their safety or the disaster that now seemed inevitable. They must have wondered whether they had taken the right step in following Him. There was a lot they still didn’t know about this man. Could He even deliver them from the disaster that now seemed inevitable?
“Just as sudden storms are inevitable on the Sea of Galilee, sudden storms can descend upon our lives as well. When this happens, the disciples’ predicament becomes ours: How is it possible to place your hope in a God who allows perfect storms to assail us?”
- Dr. David Jeremiah, Hope, Living Fearlessly in a Scary World
“God, who has made us, knows what we are and that our happiness lies in Him. Yet we will not seek it in Him as long as He leaves us any other resort where it can even plausibly be looked for. While what we call ‘our own life’ remains agreeable, we will not surrender it to Him. What then can God do in our interests but make ‘our own life’ less agreeable to us, and take away the plausible source of false happiness?”
- C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain
Last week, I interjected the C.S. Lewis quote on my own, but this week Dr. Jeremiah used the C.S. Lewis quote in his text. It may be important to know that the Lewis quote comes from a book dedicated to the atheist’s question, ‘If God is good, then why is there so much pain and suffering in this life?’ I have read two commentaries by atheists regarding the book. One commentary hated the entire book, calling Lewis’ very good argument a bunch of garbage – odd that the commentary mentioned no citing of anything in the argument being wrong, thus, I must conclude that the atheist did not like the book because he could not refute it. The other commentary disregarded the entire book, focusing on how Lewis could have never been an atheist. Otherwise, he could have never been such a traitor. Odd how two atheists tried to denigrate the book and in the process praised the book, unable to refute the argument.
But this chapter, the official first chapter of Dr. Jeremiah’s book, started with a telling of the Perfect Storm. The conclusion was that sailors (fishermen) went out to sea with a bit of fear in their hearts and minds, knowing that a storm could arise while at sea and all might be lost. Crippling fear, possibly irrational fear, would keep the fishermen on shore. But a little fear provides an awareness that there are dangers. The procedures run through your mind so that you prepare yourself for such eventualities. But the worst fear is the fear of fear itself. For no apparent reason, you curl into a ball and quit functioning. You are no good to yourself or the others on the boat.
So, we have the argument by those that think God does not exist because He lets storms happen. And we have those who fear to go out because storms might happen. And then, we have those who know that Jesus is in the boat with us. Whether we fear or not, we will put out to sea. We have the One who can calm the storm with a few choice words. “Quiet! Be still!”
But the C.S. Lewis argument here, not his entire book, is an answer (maybe among many) that if everything is calm all the time, we might be tempted to think that we can handle anything. When that happens, the weakest of storms can rock our boat, literally or figuratively, and we quickly realize how stupid we had been. But we all tend to do it, or maybe I am more like C.S. Lewis than I think, and others are not. I have seen those people who seem to pray “God, I am about to take a step with my left foot. Protect Me. Praise you, Lord! I made it. Now, Lord, I am taking a step with my right foot. Thank You, again! You are an amazing God!” Okay, I doubt if they do that, but their lives are so wrapped around loving Jesus with each breath, you cannot imagine that they would not pray such a prayer.
I was, as Lewis said about himself, a reluctant follower of Jesus. I was the good little boy and then obedient teenager who had intellect to spare so that I thought I could handle anything without God’s help. But then, I could not overcome the weight of my own sin. And since accepting Jesus, I have been in countless situations when I was deep in water, sinking, and no life vest, no oar for the boat, and God was the only way out.
Sorry, I keep using the storm at sea analogy, but this works on dry land or in an aircraft. I had more than one occasion in an aircraft as a student pilot when I knew that I needed God’s help, including the time that the pilot said that I could not leave until I cleaned the pine tree limbs from the landing gear. Yes, I pulled out of the hammerhead stall with zero time left, any lower and the instructor and I would have been statistics.
So, with all the mountain of evidence that I need God all the time, why do I go to the grocery store a few blocks away, thinking that I can handle this one on my own? If I do, I often get a child run between two cars in front of me, and I have to slam on the brakes. Or a car runs the red light, the only red light in our little town. Or I could mention a hundred other possibilities while covering a distance of less than a mile.
The storm is there to remind me that God is God and I am not, and I need God.
But, what do you do when a storm hits? What did the disciples do? They feared for their lives. They were skilled fishermen. They had sailed that sea before, but this time, they had taken on so much water, they thought they might go down with the ship. But then, maybe just one of them thought, ‘Hey! The Master is on board. He might know of a way to help us. If He can heal the sick, maybe He could make the water in the boat go out of the boat. If He could do that, we could use our skills and knowledge to reach the shore.’ The Scripture does not say it that way, but what happens next points to that thought process.
They find Jesus asleep! In Dr. Jeremiah’s telling of the story, he points out how Jesus had preached for a long time. He was exhausted. We keep thinking of Jesus as 100% God, but He was also 100% man, and as a man, Jesus needed rest. Besides, while puny man might not survive the perfect storm, Jesus “had this.”
Jesus awoke at the pleading of his disciples. He rebuked the storm with three words. “Quiet! Be still!”
And my reason for thinking what the disciples thought is their reaction. They had not gone to Jesus to have Jesus calm the storm. They never dreamed that Jesus had that kind of power. They were only interested in Jesus saving their puny lives. It seemed they were more frightened afterward than they were during the storm. I doubt if any of them wanted the storm back as an alternative. But it took some time for the fear of what great power Jesus had to transform into a different type of fear, the fear of God.
The fear of God came upon them slowly, out of the fear of being with someone with terrible power after fearing for their own lives. The fear of God is when your realize that God is this person with the power that is beyond my wildest imagination … and … and I am in awe because Jesus loves me and He would never let this storm totally consume me. This storm might change me, but it will change me for the good that makes me a better and more useful servant of my Master.
Lord, strengthen me. I cannot and will not ask You to remove the storms in my life. But sometimes, I need to be reminded that You have this storm in the palm of Your hand. You can calm the seas or You can see me safely to port in some other fashion. I praise Your Name, for You are an awesome God. And I thank You for all the storms You have seen me through. And Lord, I thank You for seeing me through the next one also. In Your name I pray. Amen.
Soli Deo Gloria. Only to God be the Glory.
Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley 
Leave a comment